Saturday, 15 August 2009

So I was waiting to get the bus to work last night and this pirate was looking at apartments in the estate agents. He turned round and I noticed that he'd been shopping at Budgens, which surprised me for some reason. I don't know why.

Friday, 14 August 2009

Belle Canto's Opera Hour: Tales of Love and Lies Belle Canto The premise of this romp through the world of opera was sweet and original. Our main characters, Belle and Scherzo, created a storyline around the tropes of the opera world with beautiful singing; the between-song exposition was a little stilted, however, as the dialogue let down what could have been a really well-rounded and interesting piece. The costumes were beautiful and the set well-designed, but again this was failed by poor lighting, which will hopefully be sorted out as the show's run progresses; no-one wants to be singing in the dark. The live music was lovely, though, and, despite the smallness of the space, it happily held Bizet, Mozart, Verdi and more. You'll be humming 'Libiamo' all the way to the mile. Sweet ECA, 6 - 31 Aug (not 17, 24), 4.20pm (5.10pm), £8.00 (£7.00), fpp166. tw rating: 3/5

This is from the publication Three Weeks

Again, I'm happy, apart from the ongoing fiasco with the lights. The people before us kep screwing them up for us and the rig is a bit crappy anyway. The lights haven't been right once yet. Its really annoying/

Thursday, 13 August 2009

Ir's a real weird feeling to watch a show, really enjoy it, and think "I did that". Although technically, it should be "we did that", because I left it in the hands of the most capable Joanne Bonniface while I went of to Poland.

Anyway I have watched Belle Canto's opera hour quite a few times now and I love it every time. What's really scary is waiting for the reviews to come in.

Apparently there has been one professional reveiw so far which I haven't seen, but some of the reviews from people who have been to see it have started to trickle in.

Here's the latest 3.

So good we saw it twice

13 Aug 2009

reviewer: Nick and Sarah Page, UKA highly enjoyable show with a wide range of music woven into an examination of love and passion. Seasoned opera lovers will enjoy the beautifully sung arias - including lesser known ones. An ideal introduction for those who have never seen opera before, with enough familiar tunes to draw you in and a storyline to put into context what you are listening to. The cast brought out the full emotion and eroticism of opera in an intimate setting. Two of us went yesterday and we came back with six more people today!

bravo 11 Aug 2009 reviewer: keith, scotlandThe perfect introduction to the seductive power of great opera. It's basically the same idea as Scottish Opera's "Essential" tours - a linked programme of short and well-chosen arias, beautifully performed at close range and with minimal props by a versatile and hugely talented troupe of singers. The links let it down slightly, being palpable nonsense, but the charm and excellence of the performances make this a real oasis of afternoon delight.

I never knew 10 Aug 2009 reviewer: David Gilhaedril, BritainI'm not an opera fan, but this show was so joyous, so sad in places and so much fun in others that its awakened my desire to find out more. The cast are obviously enjoying what they do and are doing it well. This is a damn good way to spend an hour.

Monday, 10 August 2009

As a host of Geek Syndicate, I’m always on the lookout for geek stuff and there is a plethora of it on TV, in comics, books and the movies. As an actor I have recently been thinking about the perceived lack of it on stage. Earlier this year, a Geek Syndicate listener wrote a sketch for me, that was set aboard the International Space Station and this was later performed. So it was with a great deal of curiosity that I thought that I could use my limited time at this year’s Edinburgh Fringe festival to investigate what existed of Geek Culture on stage.

Perusing the fringe guide the first thing that my eyes fell on was Bane. Here’s the blurb –

“Bruce Bane is a hired hand that gets the job done. Join Bane as he works his way through the city in this dark comedic tale of revenge. One-man film noir parody with live music.”

My first thought was that the name was disturbingly familiar to Bruce Banner, alter ego of the Incredible Hulk. My second thought was I like film noir. My third was this could be really bad.

So armed with my Geek Syndicate press pass, a pen and a paper I went to check it out.It starts with a guitarist playing a bluesy Latino theme tune, which turns into a suspenseful strum, as we are party to an offstage panicked phone call. Eventually we see the character making the call. He is scared and packing, obviously intending to get out of town. Another, invisible character enters, killing him. The actor wheels round makes a machine gun sound and shouts “Bane”. The movie has begun.

Bane is a nasty piece of work, who shoots first and isn’t even bothered about the questions. For the next hour, the writer performer Joe Bone single handedly and without props takes you through a week in the life of Bruce Bane. He also plays all the other characters, Alonso the Italian Chef, Mavis the receptionist, Victor Necropolis, the mad scientist and more; each character clearly defined and represented.

This is a brilliant story; it has everything you want from a noir production, thrills, spills, twists in the plot and a brilliant villain with a unique method of killing his victims. To my surprise, the narrative held together very well, with plot elements weaving in and of the story appropriately.Wonderfully Bone manages to incorporate a lot of action into this show. Not only are the fight scenes graphic, fun and well executed but he even pulls of a pretty good car chase.

The writer/performer obviously has his geek credentials well established as I saw references to Leon, Blues Brothers, Batman, Back to the Future and Kill Bill amongst others.

This was a well spent hour, funny and dramatic by turns. If you should get the chance to see Bane by Whiteface Productions, then do. Somehow, one man, a bare stage and a guitarist made the most wonderful cinematic theatre I’ve seen and the best thing is that in good cinema tradition, they’ve left it open for a sequel.

So I'm back in a wi-fi world now. I'll come back to talking about Poland soon. On Wednesday morning I arrived back in London. In the evening, I rehearsed the opera Orfeo and Eurydice which I'm directing for the first week of September; and then on Thursday morning I flew of to Edinburgh to help tech the show Belle Canto's Opera hour - tales of Love and Lies.

The tech was an umitigated disaster because of some problems with the venues and our show that day was cancelled. I had an emergency which meant I had to fly back to london and trained back to Edinburgh the following day.

The show however is going very well and I'm going onthe search for some sci-fi/fantasy theatre